


Golden Eyes

by Nikolaila



Category: Bleach
Genre: AU, Ichigo is a cat a lot of the time, M/M, Time Travel, Winter War more like Twenty Year War
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-03-08
Updated: 2020-09-19
Packaged: 2021-02-27 20:20:25
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 10,454
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22831660
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nikolaila/pseuds/Nikolaila
Summary: Twenty years of sporadic fighting, feeling the three worlds slowly dying from rot, and a strange circle carved into a broken street. These are the gifts that Aizen has left for his enemies.Or,Urahara Kisuke and Kurosaki Ichigo are gifted a boon they cannot remember and an unexpected opportunity to ensure that what they went through never has to happen. Although the ways they ensure this are a bit strange.
Relationships: Kurosaki Ichigo/Urahara Kisuke
Comments: 30
Kudos: 495





	1. Stars Burn Out One by One

**Author's Note:**

> Its a fic. Hooray.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The world may be fading but idiots, nightmares, and the need for investigation of strange objects never seem to change.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The world is fading. Lost idiots still have to be found though.

The night is so very quiet now. It still rings false to Ichigo’s ears; where is the noise of people living? Even though Karakura is much smaller than places like Kyoto or Tokyo there should still be a lot more noise than this. The emptiness and silence makes it feel as if Karakura is abandoned; is a place for ghosts and the dead. Except the dead and their ghosts are actually a noisy lot, so metaphorically dead and ghosts.

It’s not something he really wants to discuss with anyone, but he’s pretty sure that they’re losing this war of attrition against Aizen and his forces. It’s been almost _twenty_ _years_ since the skirmishing started and he’s fairly sure that it’s still nowhere near complete. Oh he’s become very aware of the Shinigami’s opinion of timeframes thank you very much. But even he can see that souls fail to thrive when they reside in Soul Society; even in the heart of Seireitai you can smell the undertones of death and rot and it only gets more desolate and barren the further out you go. And the hollows that creep out of Hueco Mundo these days feel wrong, thankfully though its not to the level of Aizen’s purposefully twisted experiments wrong. That feels like eldritch abominations shrieking discordantly in agony so great that they’ve gone mad. The unaltered ones from Hueco Mundo don’t feel like abominations; they just don’t feel right. Perhaps like a rabid dog or something, their energy feels wrong on an instinctive level.

Aizen has most of what he wants anyway. Or at least what he’s said he wanted. There might be a difference between the two, but it doesn’t seem to matter when they can’t seem to make any permanent headway. Oh, they can kill his Hogeyoko created abominations, maybe catch and kill a commander or two of his forces, might destroy a base of operations; but none of it seems to slow him down. Maybe it’s posturing and Aizen is becoming as worn down as they are, but they don’t know. It doesn’t help at all that no one can figure out how Soul Society and Hueco Mundo started warping and no one has any plausible ideas for how to either stop or reverse it.

Kisuke has been researching and experimenting obsessively for the past decade trying desperately to figure anything about the cause of the ever creeping rot and wrongness and getting nowhere. It still made his heart ache to think of the night Kisuke whispered in his ear, _I don’t know, I don’t know where to even start as it doesn’t make any logical sense. Had this been posed as a curious what if scenario to me a century and a half ago I would have said your premise was faulty, that it was an interesting thought but not something that would have even the slightest possibility to actually occur. And I would have been wrong. I don’t know how to even start to try and fix this problem Ichigo, I don’t know if we even can fix this. But I’ll try. For you I’ll try._

It had taken quite a while to get Kisuke calm enough to sleep for a couple hours after that revelation.

Ichigo shook his head sharply to clear the lingering thoughts of the past out and went back to considering the slowly elongating afternoon shadows. Perhaps if he stared hard enough they would consolidate into the Shinigami who was already five minutes late from returning on their patrol?

No?

No.

It was just wishful thinking.

He’d give them an additional ten minutes to show up before he started tracing their patrol route in reverse order. Just because he hadn’t sensed anything that could be trouble recently didn’t mean there wasn’t any lurking around. Or that the late fool hadn’t been felled by a more mundane hazard then Aizen, Aizen’s traps, or Aizen’s abominations. A roofing tile strike to the head can knock you out just as surely as a pommel strike to the head; the former wouldn’t even have any intent behind it to alert the senses if wandering unaware. And foolish Shinigami only ever worried about the latter as a risk.

Ichigo waited quietly as another five minutes passed, listening to the subdued noise of the city and watching the shadows slowly grow longer. 

There was a soft click-thud of someone landing on the roof behind him just loud enough to be intentional instead of accidental, reiatsu presence obscured to the point of being unidentifiable except as not of Aizen or his creations but it didn’t feel like a threat to his person.

He turned hoping it was Haru, but not expecting it to be. 

Ichigo sighed softly, he was right to not expect Haru, it was Kisuke who was now slowly and silently heading towards him. 

Except... Kisuke should still be sleeping the sleep of the overworked and overtired, he’d gotten to the point of rambling about ink composition varieties and their differing usefulness in kido script. Which while interesting to know, was about fifteen tangents over from the original conversation. He’d counted. Three hours of sleep was not enough to counteract probably three days of no sleep on top of Kisuke’s long standing exhaustion from stress and research binges that he didn’t give himself enough time to recover from before starting another and this never ending conflict with Aizen. 

Ichigo could see the exhaustion still lingering on Kisuke’s form, no matter how successfully he hid it from the others. It was in the little habits he fell into when exhausted. The utter effacement of his reiatsu presence was one of the more noticeable ones, the other being the silent stutter-stalking walk he had that let him sneak so well.

So he would ask, fairly certain of the answer to come, but Kisuke would not speak of his nightmares without prompting. Not unless they were both in bed, in the dark, and the aftermath had awoken them both. The only thing he could do to help is ask, and be aware of what type of nightmare had awoken Kisuke and driven him to find Ichigo.

“Couldn’t sleep?” He asked softly once Kisuke had sat down within an arms length of him.

Kisuke hummed softly before replying “Oh, the dreams weren’t very pleasant sleeping companions too filled with blood and viscera for my tastes. So I came to find you as you are a much better substitute.” Kisuke flicked his fingers as if the topic of his nightmares was of no concern.

Ichigo made a non-committal hum. It was the only reply he could give. Expressing the internal wince he’d felt at Kisuke’s nightmare selection wouldn’t get them anywhere but a spiral of self-pity. Ichigo had that type of nightmare several times before. Nothing much except being in the presence of those who’d starred in your dreams would help. Being unable to help while you watched those you cared for slowly, methodically, and graphically tortured to death, well it took a while to scrub those images out of your brain.

They sat together in companionable silence for several minutes; Ichigo continuously scanning the skyline looking for Haru, Kisuke just breathing and letting his reiatsu fold around Ichigo as a meditative exercise.  
  
“Why were you lurking on this roof instead of in the Shoten? You aren’t on the schedule for being on a patrol for a couple more days.”

“I was starting to feel claustrophobic in the building. So I went for the roof.” Ichigo shrugged. “Was out here for the view, but Haru is now almost fifteen minutes past their safe check-in time slot. I know they’ve got another hour before we should go looking, but I’ve felt uneasy today, and Haru might be a clumsy idiot but they usually arrive either on time or early. If they’re late, they’ve run into something.”

He stood up and turned to face Kisuke before continuing. “I’m going to go look for them, would you like to come along?”

Kisuke nodded once, stood in a single fluid motion, and gestured grandly “Lead on.”

Ichigo felt his face twitch with a small smile, before he nodded sharply, spun to face the opposite direction, and started running for the next roof. He could feel Kisuke start following him on near silent feet.

* * *

There were no recent signs of either Hollows or Aizen’s forces in the six blocks away from the Shoten their path took, but around the seventh something started to feel _off_ to his senses and Ichigo slowed down. At one of the narrower points between two streets in the tenth block he stopped to stare at the building on the opposite side of the road. Kisuke stalked up to stand beside him and tilted his head thoughtfully to examine the facade of the buildings opposite of the street to their location. 

“Hmm. There seems to be a lack of people shopping or running those very well maintained stores. But then again from what I can see in the windows their products look to be years out of date.” Kisuke tilted his head in the opposite direction. “That along with the sense of ill-ease, be elsewhere, and ignore this area that permeates the block makes me rather curious. However this is your search, should we poke this anomaly or keep searching for Haru?”

“Poke it. Haru is the type to _investigate_ any and all anomalies they run into. Even if maybe they should have gone back for backup.”

”Ah, alas I have _never_ encountered anyone whose behavior comes even _close_ to that level of curiosity.” A saccharine sweet false smile spread across Kisuke’s face as he spoke.

Ichigo snorted sharply at the expression on his face, rolled his eyes, took a couple steps back and leapt for the opposite side of the road. And had to execute a rolling landing when he passed through an illusion and his original choice of landing position ended up being far more destroyed than it appeared from across the street.

Kisuke followed through a few seconds afterwards. He’d had to roll as well, but came up frowning thoughtfully as he examined the new appearance of the area around them.

Ichigo examined the area as well, frown growing deeper as they both cautiously moved towards the opposite edge of the building to get a better view of the previously illusion hidden area. The muffled quality of sound that originated from outside the illusionary barrier was worrisome. The state of the area inside the barrier was even more worrisome. Lack of people noise, severe structural damage to multiple buildings, damage to the walkway below that looked too precise to be incidental; just too many things that read as _wrong_ to his senses. To Kisuke’s senses as well if the slight furrow between his brows was deepening like that.

“I do _not_ like the implications of that illusionary barrier we just went through. Anything that incorporates a sense of everything is fine, move along now tends to be a trap. And most of the damage below doesn’t look recent. So is this either an old trap that we failed to spring when they wanted us to or this an old test to see if we could detect certain things and we failed it. Its area _is_ relatively small and this is on the far side of where we would send patrols. But it’s not the dangerous side so, when _was_ the last time someone with a very acute sense of their surroundings went out in this general vicinity?”

Ichigo blinked slowly at Kisuke’s ramble, worriedly noting that Kisuke must be more exhausted than he had originally thought. Normally he didn’t do verbalization of his stream of conscious thought in areas that were not his lab. “It’s been a while. At minimum it’s been several months, but from the state of decay and plant life here it might have been several years. Trap or not we have to examine it anyway. Traces of Haru’s reiatsu is within this ... bubble.” 

“The traces I can feel reek of shock, pain, and death.”

“Probably are dead, they weren’t very cautious.” He sighed and shook his head sharply. “Still we have to go see if we can find their body.”

Kisuke nodded and launched himself off the roof to the ground, landed silently and started searching in a clockwise spiral, Ichigo followed him to the ground to start their search as they slowly circled around the damaged and decaying buildings and roads. 

Their slow spiral towards the center turned up several interesting things, but left more questions in their wake.

They had noticed that the damage was old while up on the roof, but beyond the weathering caused by being exposed to the elements there were no signs of animals having been in residence. No tracks, no scat, no fur or feathers or bones, no scent, not even spider webs. Just damaged buildings. It was creepy. Even Aizen’s abandoned and/or destroyed lairs would have signs of animals residing within. Insects and rodents were difficult to keep out entirely. 

The too uniform damage to the concrete and stone walkways turned out to be characters carved into the concrete; some are very clear, some are bisected by cracks, some were obliterated by damage and unable to be guessed at.

Upon examining a set that was more intact Kisuke swore that they looked like kido script, an older one not much used anymore, but that from the ones found it’s the foundation of the barrier structure. That several characters being very damaged, even though kido barriers tend to be repetitive, is why presumably Haru and then themselves had successfully found their way inside without being repelled in some fashion.

Halfway through their circle they found Haru’s corpse. Cause of death seems to have been a very unlucky fall into a building. Part of the roof they’d landed on had broken underneath them and before they could recover from an poor landing choice, the rest of the facade and a quarter of the building just collapsed on top of them. He’d like to blame it on Hollows or Aizen but there’s not a single trace of either of them here. It’s still an odd way for a Shinigami to have died, but the puddle of blood means there probably was sharp metal in the heavy debris that landed on top of Haru. As they could do nothing for Haru they continued cautiously onward.

  
There was a curious lack of _anything_ either Hollow or Aizen or Spirit Realm related anywhere besides the kido script carved into some of the sidewalk and courtyard. There should be some signs newer than the destruction that took place and there simply isn’t. 

“Maybe the barrier did as it should have but in a manner that was too effective?” Kisuke mused, “It worked, but he forgot to include himself in a keying of it so once he left he couldn’t find it again.”

“Maybe, it’s a bit weird that he’d forget that part though.”

“It’s all in the scripts used, the modern style includes the maker’s reiatsu as part of a key so they can change it. Older script was meant for large cooperative efforts so the keying of those able to manipulate it is a separate step. If you forget it the construct runs until it breaks or uses up its energy.”

“Huh.”

With a lack of anything that read of threats in the area of the bubble that they could find, they both headed back to Haru’s unfortunate final resting place and were musing over if they should attempt to get the body down and how they would go about doing so and getting it back to their base of operations in as few pieces as possible or if it would be better to have a field cremation.

As they started to lever off the debris on top of Haru’s corpse the level of background reiatsu spiked sharply behind them so they both turned to try and locate the source of the change. There was a sudden and short flash of white light and to an outside perspective they vanished.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Shriek. I give up. I’m just gonna yeet the fic into the void. Maybe it will inspire me to fix later things in my unfinished mess.
> 
> No beta we flail like fools.


	2. A Forgotten Dream

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Soul King is a concept. They have strange views of time.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It’s naught but a dream. Surreal is how those go.

_The pathway is half hidden under rubble and dying grasses, no footprints are left behind in the lingering dust as he walks along the path following the shade of another, knowing and yet not capable of seeing that another soul walks besides him. Just as he is incapable of discerning the features of the one he follows.  
_

_“We are fading, and with us fades this set and unbalances the remaining ones.” The voice is a set of contradictions that makes his head hurt to listen to; old, young, male, female, a sole voice, a ringing choir, whisper screamed, emotively empty. “There is none to take my place now; the pre-existing damage should they try would destroy them. Not even if all the candidates were to attempt to sit upon my throne would it work.”_

_The voice is quiet for a while as they pass between the damaged doors of a palace in ruin. One hangs outward relying on a single lower hinge to not crash upon the ground. The other has but a hands breadth of wood remaining on the hinges the rest lies splintered on the floor of the antechamber. They continue to leave no trace of their passing even as they step upon the broken splinters of what used to be a door, as they step upon rugs so thick with dust they’ve turned grey, as they step into a carmine puddle that looks as if it had been there for both years and yet spilt less than ten minutes prior. Nothing marked their passage through the chamber. He thinks he should feel something about being in this place, about seeing this place, about his lack of affecting this place, but it feels like the timelessness of its ruin has seeped into his thoughts and now he is as timeless as this ruin. Whichever ruin it is._

_The leader stays silent until they pass into a hallway blanketed in dust. The dust upon the floor is uninterrupted by any human footprint, or swish of a robe, or an animal track. “There are still options of course. But none I think that are appealing to the souls who dance through the ouroboros of life.” There was a soft rattling sigh released from the unknown leader. Which yet sounded as if someone had recorded the sounds of every person of every age and smashed the recording together so you could hear every unique way of doing it at the same time. His head hurt hearing it. “Aizen Sousouke broke his own ouroboros when he used the tool known to you as a Hogeyoku. Unknown to him it granted him a limited immortality, immune to the ravages of age but not immunity from lethal outcomes.” The entity paused, hummed softly before continuing. “Had that been his only action it would not have affected the flow to any measurable degree. Souls are rarely destroyed and new ones are created often enough to prevent an imbalance.”_

_The halls around them grew dimmer as they continued down the hallway towards ... something. He still wasn’t sure where they were, or who was walking beside him, or even who he was. Alarmingly this wasn’t alarming, and even the sense of urgency he felt upon realizing this faded quickly into nothingness. Until he knew that he should be and yet was not concerned._

_The leader continued, their discordant voice sounding almost sad. “Aizen Sousouke with the assistance of the power held within what you call the Hogyoku broke the bindings of the throne to the ouroboros of souls. We do not believe he intended to do so, after all such actions would lead to all that he desires to fade to naught.” A sigh that rang like flattened windchimes, “We are not what we once were, we cycle through the ouroboros ourself you see. We ebb and rise like the tides or moon. That this breaking of the ouroboros came at our fading, before we could reform. So not only do we lack the strength to correct this mistake, none who could have followed and held the throne as we waxed stronger resting in the tides could actually do so as the broken cycle would cry for them to repair it. And they could not do so as they would lack the strength to break both the compulsion for the ouroboros to fall apart and wrangle the splintered cycle back into the state it once held.”_

_There was a door that appeared suddenly at the edge of the hall. It stood as if it had always been there, and yet no dust or sign of age marred its surface unlike every other object that they had passed. The leader did not hesitate as they approached and the door swung open inwards without a gesture or word. He and his companion followed them in, and was softly disturbed by the way it swung shut behind them and vanished. The leader flickered over a pool of what looked to be but was not water and turned around to consider the depths. Even from this new angle, He still could not register what their face looked like. He and the one who walked beside him approached the pool and stopped a step away from the edge. The fact the there were ripples lapping at the stone of the pools edge that made no noise was disturbing._

_”You who have made a piece of that which you call the Hogyoku, I gift the chance to fix this irritation. After all we can wait out the draining of the souls that resides within the ouroboros, to remake all would merely be a mild irritation after an eon of boredom. To ensure that you do not lose yourself to madness the one who walks with you will accompany you on your quest. They shall have a form, which will be our boon to you.”_

_He could feel the sensation this being displaying of a too sharp smile, even though he still could not perceive a face. It made the hairs down the back of his neck stand on end._

_“We find the antics of the spirits of Soul Society, the hollows of Hueco Mundo, and the ingenuity of those who reside in the Living World to be amusing to us. Otherwise we’d simply watch it fade and start anew. Success or failure, it is up to you. We have all the time to wait and watch, you do not.” They gave a shrug. “Neither of you will remember this conversation in any great detail anyway so I see no point to elaborate further. So, make your future choices wisely.”_

_Before he could make himself speak the pool rose up and swallowed them both up with an odd flash of light, before returning to its ringed boundaries leaving only the first figure behind to watch the ripples of not water form strange shapes with a smile on their face._

* * *

Urahara Kisuke awoke on a futon in what was once his little sleeping place off the Twelfth Division Captain’s office. And did not know how he awoke there over a century behind and a realm over from where he had been standing with Ichigo when there had been a flash of light.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I still blame discord.


	3. Awakening

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Well, there are worse places to wake up than this. But why is everything so strange.

(Seireitai, Twelfth Division Captain’s Nook)

He’s awake. He knows he’s awake because he either has lucid dreams or blood soaked dreams that spin on even when he wants them to stop and he can’t do  _anything to alter the circumstances __..._

_Breathe_.

_Blink_. 

_ Refocus. _

And this place in which he is aware and sitting on a futon with the quilt in his lap is neither. Nor is it within Benihime’s court-like domain that makes up his inner world. He can feel her surprise at their surroundings. At the state of their surroundings. At the reiatsu signatures they can sense. At his current physical condition. It’s strange that his hands don’t ache, that his skin doesn’t harshly pull  anywhere when he goes through the subtle and then the not so subtle body status checking stretches. He’s fairly close to being in physically peak condition if not for being a little bit under the optimal weight. Which is _wrong_. 

Last he can remember before that eerie energy flare and the flash he had been exhausted, his hands had been deeply aching on the decade old healed breaks indicating a storm starting to roll in, and the skin on his thighs had still pulled quite a bit from the scar tissue where he’d lost a fair bit of skin from not quite managing to avoid a nasty kidou trap three years ago. And he had Ichigo with him. Ichigo isn’t within his passive range. Nor, now that’s he’s focusing on it, is he within his active range. Which brings up a secondary problem; while he  _can_ identify those presences, they  _aren’t_ aligning with what he most recently remembers them being. 

Which means there are three very likely possibilities.

First he might be trapped in one of Aizen’s illusions, most likely a kidou trap set up in the square he and Ichigo were investigating, and he’s now stuck inside his head and physically he’s now in a likely comatose collapsed heap. This is not as likely as it could be, as such a trap would have likely gotten rid of his uncertainty and tried to block off memories of his present (future?). Perhaps it would have made the memories of the supposed future faded and boring as if it were naught but a dream made from eating too heavily before sleeping. Also, Benihime is alarmed, and he can tell that she is in such a state; were this purely an illusion Aizen would have done his damnedest to diminish his capability to hear his Zanpakutou. Or to at least warp her senses and/or memory as well. 

Second option; he’s finally suffered a complete and total psychotic break and is hallucinating so very hard on all his senses. This is extremely unlikely as he can hear Benihime, and her opinion of hallucinogenics is a complete and total denial. If she is still present in his head and not denying that his current location is a false construct of his broken mind then he’s not hallucinating his surroundings. It is a bit of circular logic, but when Benihime can restructure  _anything within her grasp_ there isn’t really much of a point arguing with her. As well his mental stability affects her court so her court affects his mental stability.

Third option is that he time traveled and managed to have his conscious mind fall into his past body. Which is alarming on several fronts if true. First being, Ichigo was right next to him when that flare went off  and _he didn’t exist yet in this century_. Secondly, even if they  did  travel in time; why to this era and how? It can’t have been Aizen, even if the hidden square of town was his fault there isn’t any way for that damaged barrier kidou to have mutated into something that could cause this. The old style of script was very prominent and one of the well known features of it was its symbol definition inflexibility; it does as it is cast-drawn to do. As it ages and it’s symbols are damaged it may lose strength but it would either do as designed or not work. Or perhaps implode...

**Refocus**.

Why is he thinking on  how _they_ traveled  when Ichigo isn’t _here_? He knows Ichigo doesn’t have a body in this era to fall into, and yet when he digs deep in his memory trying to understand how  they he got here, he feels like there were two eerie flashes and a dream-like conversation with  something in-between the two. Something about your companion is your boon. The harder he tries to focus on it the more it slips away and a nasty headache starts to form. He gives up on that thought and rubs at his temples with both hands. Which brings back to mind his curious lack of scars. 

Sighing softly, he slipped out of his futon and silently stalked to where he had once kept the small silver mirror Yoruichi had gifted to him  after  he had learned to proficiently shave in the dark by touch alone. Might as well see what his face looked like without the scars he’d grown accustomed to seeing. Ichigo would either turn up in less than a week or Aizen and his cronies would start becoming very permanently dead. It wouldn’t do to miss any of the sympathizers, best to give himself a week to plan his actions and scout things out first before acting. It was probably a foolish bit of hope to hold onto that Ichigo would appear but it was  _his_ little bit of fire to burn his fingers on. 

_Oh_. He’d forgotten how  young his face had looked without the scarring and stubble. He poked his cheek thoughtfully,  if Ichigo had traveled as well and kept all of his scarring he’d look to be the older of the pair even if it was the opposite in truth. The thought brought a wobbly short lived smile to his face before he set the mirror back in place and got ready to face the day. Illusion checking and information gathering waited on no one’s break down.

* * *

(Rukongai, Somewhere, Middle Districts)

He startled awake hard and sat up before freezing and digging his fingers into the dirt, realizing that his surroundings were nothing like he last remembered them being. And the plant life was too  lush to match his memories of the last time he’d visited the Rukongai districts. 

He had nothing with him, Kisuke wasn’t here, and trying to think about the flare-flash that occurred before he took this apparent dirt nap in a Rukongai middle district makes his head  hurt to the point he’d rather take one of Isshin’s kicks to the head. He jammed his fingers into his temples to try and ward off the headache that even trying to focus on the flash had caused and instinctively reached out with his senses to see if there was going to be anything else trying to make his day  worse.

Of  course there was. And it wasn’t even something he could take his frustrations out on. There was a small patrol approaching his location slowly but without intent. He even recognized the reiatsu trace of three of the four shinigami in the patrol. 

He scowled harder once he realized who the traces belonged to. Fuck, he really wasn’t in the mood to deal with that particular Shinigami and their friends. Gossipy harpies the lot of them. He’d normally be more concerned about what the hell they’re doing this deep in Rukongai without a stronger escort but this place feels  different , he has a vicious headache, and they frequently insulted Kisuke in subtle ways. If there’s a hollow attack he’ll go assist but otherwise no. No, he is not dealing with people right now. He’d be too tempted to literally bite them right now. 

Still scowling from the slow to fade headache; he twisted his reishi into the familiar required pattern and became cat shaped. Then, after giving a full body shake leaped into the tree above where he had woken up. And curled up to try and take a nap hoping that the headache would fade enough to think given an hour or two. Hopefully the patrol of Shinigami were passing through and would be gone by the time he woke up.

It was the sound of conversation occurring directly below him that woke him from his, according to his inner clock, short lived nap. 

“Its a clearing. It looks like any other clearing.”

“It is the most central of the clearings in this district.”

“It’s still sleeping on dirt and rocks. Couldn’t we have stayed in the inn?”

“We are on a mission to look for hollow incursions. No, we are not staying at an inn, there’s a greater chance we would end up missing details. Stop complaining about the rocks, I’ve seen you wake up from sleeping in strange positions without your neck locking up.”

Fuck. They just had to pick the clearing he woke up in. What even is his luck. Now he can’t even attempt to leave until it’s much closer to dark. He’s fast but not that fast, and cats with his size and coloration aren’t very common this far away from a settlement. So he’d be a memorable event, which is something he really doesn’t want to be. Shinigami are fueled by gossip. And liquor. Liquor soaked gossip travels fastest. He doesn’t want any district of origin rumors to be tied to speculations on his appearance if he has to be in Seireitai for any length of time. He flicked his tail irritably and suppressed the urge to growl. 

They were being so careless too. In his opinion this wasn’t the best option of a clearing for setting up a camp, especially if they really were in the Southern Twenty-Fifth district. Nor were they putting up the initial steps for a dedicated barrier.

And they were so  talkative. He suspected he’d managed to successfully suppress his memories of just how much that set of Shinigami liked to talk and gossip. It was going to be helpful in determining what was looking to be his rather alarming current situation, but fuck it did not help his  headache at all. Especially with that faked laugh, dear kami that high pitched shrieking giggle made him want to gouge his ears out. Or perhaps their throat. He shook his head sharply and seemingly scowled at the tree branch. 

No, no throat ripping your allies. 

_ One less irritating person? _

If we started we’d never do anything else, the world is full of fools. You’d get bored.

_ Eh fair enough. _

He continued scowling as sharply as a cat could as he listened to the rambling, gossiping conversation below. If it hadn’t been for the early off-handed comment on some distant cousin (whose name he’d filed away as a probably trivial unimportant fact and promptly ignored) expected year of graduation he wouldn’t have paid terribly much attention to them at all and instead tried to sleep or at least meditate if that failed. The Shinigami below his perch after all were  known to be a gossipy lot and therefore never given any information that others should not overhear.

But their rather odd usage of future tense to refer to a date that had to have occurred nearly a hundred and twenty odd years ago had thoroughly caught his attention. 

The gossiping conversations they held below did not help. 

But he stayed. He listened. It was something he had known for a long time; having any information on your situation helps more than none.

Titters about how Shiba Kaien was possibly being groomed to be Lieutenant of Thirteenth Division. And whispers back that it might take another quarter century before he took up the role because he is a rather young clan head and those duties come first of course.

Bitter moaning about how of course the Fifth Division stole all the prodigies with their newest recruit being the very young Ichimaru Gin but he’d graduated from the academy with such speed that he was still growing into himself. Did you really want a tiny prodigy to be on your patrols when you were more accustomed to more mature mindsets. The consensus below seemed to be ambivalence, with a side of don’t let Hiyori hear you comment on someone’s size.

And whispers of a new Captain of Twelfth Division. Of whom they have no familiarity with as they were appointed after they had left for their patrol a little less than month ago. But they knew that the previous Captain leaving had been planned for years, and that they were the sort to always go through with their plans means that they had already left the position was assured. 

The rest was fairly inconsequential to him as he sat there and let their voices turn into background noise as he considered what he’d learned through the rest of the gossip. He didn’t particularly care who thought who was more attractive and/or what the dating life of Seireitai consisted of. 

Ignoring how the hell he’d managed to land in the past, he was pretty far back. And possibly alone. Although what he could  do  to ensure Aizen and his research died was a tricky question. He could kill Aizen easily enough and his conscious wouldn’t protest; Kisuke had spelled out exactly how long it took to build certain things and how much long term planning powerful intelligent Shinigami put into their schemes. Aizen had already committed atrocities. Even by the more lenient standards of this time. The issues would be ensuring his research died as well and surviving the fallout. Both of which were a bit more difficult to plan around seeing as they’d never  found all of Aizen’s original labs in the first place. As well as having a lot of people after his head if it was known he’d been the one to kill him; after all Aizen played the facade of the respectful Lieutenant, his death would be seen as murder and the soul who did the crime would be hunted down. 

He tilted his head as he considered potential options. Maybe he could get away with killing Aizen if he caught him on patrol and shredded him with his Hollow formed talons instead of using either his Zanpakutou or a destructive kidou.

He gave his head a shake and suppressed a sigh. Planning wouldn’t do him much good without having more information.

He’d start heading towards Seireitai once it got closer to dusk in a couple hours. He needed more reliable information on when exactly he’d arrived. If he was lucky perhaps Kisuke had traveled as well, perhaps. But that’s being horrifically optimistic about his situation; even if it isn’t his Kisuke though Urahara is an incredibly curious person he’d at least be willing to listen. What he’d do afterwards is still in question, but at least he’d listen before trying to kill or experiment on him. Unlike some of the other captains who’d try to kill him on sight if he suddenly appeared, after all he shouldn’t be in Seireitai therefore he’s suspect in anything and everything as an outsider who doesn’t belong. 

Perhaps he should do reconnaissance on the current situation in Seireitai before reaching out to an Urahara who wasn’t his. If he knows when the academy has intake he could maybe enroll as a student. Or was it be scouted as a student? That could get tricky. Hmm.

He shifted around to a more comfortable position to wait out the next few hours. Trying to figure out why he didn’t really want to go through the academy except as a last resort. Besides that his instincts were geared towards combat and he’d be very tempted to bite irritating people. Possibly it was that he had too much experience with combat and hollows and his reactions would be off from the other new intakes which would mean he would be paid a lot of attention...

_Wait_.

There’s a living Shiba clan head?

Fuck. They had mentioned Shiba Kaien hadn’t they. 

Which meant a living, consolidated clan made up of people who were very much like Isshin. If not even more extreme. He had heard the stories about what they got up to and into. Yoruichi had told him stories about the mayhem and chaos with glee, Kisuke had focused on the technical side of their physical aids for chaos, Tessai’s had focused on kido mastery and the Shiba’s flair for it, and Isshin had told any stories with fond, if drunk, remembrance. All of which had painted a picture of a group of people that while he wouldn’t mind having them as backup really didn’t want to spend excessive amounts of time around. Just thinking about Isshin’s energy and chaos made him tired and the stories, even if exaggerated a bit, painted a picture of a family where Isshin’s energy level and chaos were the average. Meaning there were those who were  worse . And he had a fairly strong resemblance to them. He felt tired just thinking about interacting with the Shiba who would inevitably do their best to pull him into their sphere of influence because he looked like some other relatives cousin or sibling or potentially their bastard child or some other degree of relation.

Well it was a backup plan. Might as well see if this new Twelfth Captain was  his Urahara Kisuke. If he wasn’t then well, he’d reconsider his options. Cats are fairly common in Seireitai proper, what’s one more stray lounging on a roof in the sunshine.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Still blaming discord.


	4. Searching

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Some things are best left unmodified, paranoia is your best friend to surviving a long life, and politics are not fun when you are very blunt. 
> 
> These are the thoughts of a cat shaped Ichigo as he goes about determining what the fuck is going on and does he have any allies here.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A chapter. I offer it to you.

Just as dusk starts lengthening the shadows across the clearing Ichigo snuck out of his tree to the ground and then headed outside of the camp set by the Shinigami ensuring he was outside of their sensing range before throwing himself into high speed shunpo weaving across the districts towards Seireitai. 

At least the gossiping busy bodies had given him a direction to head towards. Otherwise he would have had to make an educated guess of the district he’d landed in and which direction would have been most beneficial to to start heading towards in hopes of reaching a settlement and determining where and apparently when he was. This way he could throw himself into the near obscene sprinting speed of shunpo required to keep up with Kisuke when he was tearing away from a kidō trap he couldn’t untangle fully without detonating some of it first; it would get him to the walled gates of Seireitai by about dawn, maybe a little after if his mental clock was as off as he thought it might be. It had been the start of autumn in Karakura, but this seemed more like late spring, it could be a warm spell but the flowers present were arguing against that. Unless the flowers of Soul Society were as strange as their inhabitants, which could actually be true. He’d ask Kisuke about it later on.

Ichigo carefully stopped just outside the floating walls of Seretai, in the scrubland bushes that rand around the border and stared up at the walls. It had always made him feel a bit twitchy to have such large blocks of stone free-floating above his head when ever he’d had to pass through them. He’d noticed that it didn’t bother other Shinigami for the most part when he’d asked about why such a feature existed and why others thought it was a good idea. They just shrugged it off. Kisuke at least had the good sense to find such a thing a poor decision for standard security, but had considered it a valid way to destroy or incapacitate unwanted intruders. Ichigo had met the Shinigami who were considered the old guard. He very much believed it was put in place to divide an invading army, smashing the ones in the middle into paste would have been seen as just a nice bonus in their eyes. They were ruthless like that.

He eyed the floating walls warily, carefully reaching out with his reiatsu to ensure they hadn’t changed the collapse trigger timing. He knew that they had been set to land *before* anyone without permission crossed beneath them, but that didn’t mean someone couldn’t have tampered with them so that they would land on top of *anything* beyond a certain size that passed beneath them that lacked an appropriate identification tag. 

Because while Ichigo was fairly certain the wall’s intrusion detection methods were not set to detect, block, and repel animals, it’s still best to check carefully. You never know when a psycho could have adjusted the wards to crush anything not explicitly listed as allowed just so they could poke and laugh at the smashed corpses. Some of Aizen’s later creations had liked to set up wards like that; they liked the splatter and gore a bit too much. There was a certain twist to wards with that modification in it though so it was rather obvious if you knew what to look for. Some of the less cautious Shinigami in the conflict had not known, had insisted their warnings about said kidō traps were naught but paranoia and cowardly attitude; they had rushed into the ward trap and were thus killed in a rather grotesque manner. The only upside was the speed of their death, seeing as they had been directly underneath the trap it didn’t leave them lingering. Those who had been a bit slower off the mark had learned to listen to the warnings or at least been a little more cautious as they hadn’t wanted to become paste.

After several minutes of contemplation, he felt fairly confident that he could pass through undetected as well as uncrushed and slunk through the fairly tall grass underneath the floating walls at a quick but careful clip aware of their presence above his head the entire time it took him to pass underneath them. Once well clear of the walls, Ichigo gave a full body shudder to resettle his fur, and continued on towards one of the market districts in Seireitai. 

Ichigo twisted silently through alleys and over low lying roofs until he reached the outskirts of a day market of Seireitai. It was crowded with people who were browsing, who were on a mission for shopping, and as such the perfect place to find a small perch up high and be left undisturbed. The constant bustle and flow of people meant that reaching out with long range sensing would be hidden in the crowd’s collective output of reiatsu. If he failed to find anyone of his time here he’d consider the debate of if he should track down Urahara or just kill Aizen first. So he curled up and started carefully spreading his senses outward.

First he searched the market square in front of him. Some were vaguely familiar, probably only acquaintances or people met in passing but their reiatsu lacked the bitter grief and numbness that they had all carried once they had experienced the battlefields, Aizen’s abandoned labs, and the never ending aftermath of both in their full chaotic and bloody horror. With those dealing in cleanup and scavenging amongst those sites piling more and more nightmare fuel on top of it all.

He sighed in mild disappointment before he focused on spreading his awareness a bit further out. He wasn’t really expecting anyone else, except for maybe Kisuke, to travel back but checking was prudent.

The further reach brought into sensing range some of the Shinigami who were once among the Vizored, but they lacked the sharp cold bite of hollow, lacked the sense of sorrow and fury and rage and grief and bitterness from betrayal that had been built from over a century of exile with execution orders hanging over their heads if discovered leaving that simmering ugliness to be a continuous note in their reiatsu even if in different moments there was joy that note was always there, and the trauma of nearly twenty years of war piled on top leaving spirit deep exhaustion and fury.

Eyes focusing back in the present, Ichigo watched some what looked to be academy students looking at the ink stones for sale in the booth across the street. Their energy made him feel tired just from watching them squabble over the different quality and shades of black ink available. The fact the Vizored hadn’t traveled back was disappointing; he’s glad that they’re not in pain or feeling isolated but he’ll miss their snark.

Reaching further than that with this much detail in mind resulted in more of a scanning pattern than a circle of awareness. It required quite a bit more focus, so Ichigo stretched a bit, tucked himself into a cat shaped loaf and shut his eyes to stretch his detailed reiatsu sense still yet further out.

Further still, were allies and enemies some once dead and now among the living, pseudo-living?, what terms did the inhabitants of soul society actually use he kept forgetting to ask.  


Aizen lacked the lightning edged tingle of the hogyoko, instead was the feel of whispers, of lies, of shadows, and the steel of his Zanpakutou. Unohana felt like her usual serene death, but quite a bit less worn. Tousen felt a bit like delusions and spiderwebs, but not like the cracked insanity that had been present at the time of his death.

He found Yoruichi next, but he nearly didn’t recognize the cat goddess of flash step’s signature. Fewer sharp edges, smaller griefs and hurts, less wary, more glee, less consideration, more hubris. More princess of the Shihoin than the sharp edged wary woman shaped cat she had been in even his earliest sense memories of her. 

That she had not come back as well made Ichigo feel a bit sad, she would have been able to land on her feet much better than he ever could; she would understand how to play politics to get whichever outcome she desired. He’ll probably end up smacking some protocol in the face resulting in too many lectures and possibly a fight to the pain. His tail twitched in irritation at that. 

Then upon reaching out a little further he found Kisuke’s signature in the direction of the Twelfth division office, and wanted to melt in relief, bask in the feeling of knowing that he was not alone in this time long past. This was his Kisuke; razor edged intelligence, whispers of Benihime’s temper and bloodlust with courtly manners woven in to maintain an iron fisted control over said hunger for bloodshed and death, deep sorrow and aching loss, the sharp cold edges that he’d been told had begun with his service time in the onmitsukidou and had been further sharpened and chilled by the Gotei’s betrayal, little flickers of scientific glee, confusion and loneliness, rage carefully leashed, and the rapid flicker associated with complex calculations and ever shifting thoughts that came from a meticulous planner. 

Ichigo smiled as much as a cat could, he had Kisuke in this foreign land. He didn’t have to flail in this alien time, almost a century before his birth, alone. Didn’t have to be reliant upon the goodwill of a clan whom he’d never truly known, and found the traditions of which confounding. Didn’t have to try to out-think Aizen alone. He didn’t have to learn every single bit of the current political stance of everyone he’d meet on the fly while trying to avoid bringing excessive notice to himself. Especially as they were no longer influenced by over a century of small slights, of missing subordinates, of deaths that should not have happened on low level missions. He was so very relieved that there was someone outside of his Zanpakutou who knew exactly what he was and why he was that way, and was understanding of his odd quirks.  
  


Ichigo uncurled himself from the loaf shape on the sun warmed roof, stretched, and took off for the twelfth division and his Kisuke at a quick but inconspicuous lope over the roofs.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Screeeee. Words are hard. Decided to leave this as Ichigo only this chapter. I still blame the server for enabling. 
> 
> No beta we scream like fools.


	5. Reunion

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Paperwork and drifting thoughts. Why is life so strange? Never leave genius minds unattended they wander into labyrinths when left alone.
> 
> Kisuke is bored, and frustrated, and then very relieved.
> 
> Hiyori wants to kick people in the face.

Kisuke eyed the stacks of paper and assorted scrolls littered across the desk with well hidden disgust before sitting down at it. He really hadn’t missed this _feature_ of being a Captain of Seireitai. He’d go through all of it anyway, information is often found in unexpected places, but he really didn’t like dealing with the mostly petty bullshit that came with the useful information. But he doesn’t trust his brain to remember the current events in the detail required; having two sets of memories offering conflicting information on what happened within the past week, well seeing an Omeada budget correctly would make more sense than the mess currently inside his skull.

Unless he’s _actually_ overwritten the previous Kisuke who occupied the body. If you can overwrite your own presence? Because technically all the events this younger self recalls far more clearly than he usually bothers with occurs in the exact same fashion, if with a bit more hindsight that changes his opinion on wether an outcome was desirable. Some of the memories of events he had been proud of in _this_ present are rather cringe worthy if looked back upon through the filters developed by spending over a century in the rapidly changing living world and having Ichigo present in his life for a couple of decades.

So perhaps it’s more of an appended set of memories and knowledge instead of an overwrite? That still feels like an incorrect conclusion, but Benihime is from future him and not _this_ present so perhaps it’s an optical illusion type of conundrum in that it looks wrong but is in fact correct. Still doesn’t resolve the difficulty of where Ichigo went. He’d been right next to him when the flare had occurred so where or possibly _when_ did he land? ~~Did he even come through?~~ Perhaps Ichigo had been dumped into the middle of Menos Forest and was cursing as he stomped through it trying to find a place where he could tear a portal through realms to hunt Kisuke down. Even Ichigo would take a couple of days to get back to him from that sort of landing. And would show up still coated in Hollow ichor, shaking sand from his hair, shikikousu with ragged hems from claws catching at the edges, and grumbling about having had to trek out from the center of the forest he’d been dumped into without warning. And complaining about the date being horribly wrong did he know about why the date was being very wrong?

Kisuke tsked at himself softly. Obviously he’d gone a bit soft if the all-nighter he’d pulled last night was affecting his level of focus this badly. Then again, this hadn’t been his body for very long, and the conflicting memories of _relative time_ aside he had the feeling _this_ him wasn’t quite as looked after to ensure nourishment and rest were kept on a fairly even keel. The far more _recent_ clear memories of binging on science without anyone interrupting for tea, sleep, or training breaks would very well explain why he looked to be about seven kilos off. Or would it be two kan? Soul society’s fondness for outdated units and his slightly lacking muscle mass and healthy fat levels aside; at least he knew that Aizen was most definitely not a time traveler as well. Or had some sort of memory vision of a possible likely future. maybe. Hmm. Either way Aizen did not have a completed hogyoko imbedded in his chest. It would be easy enough to render him fully dead if he managed to sneak up on him. The only reason he hadn’t killed the man last night was the difficulty in managing to do so without drawing either attention or difficult to wave suspicion upon himself. He’d served as a jailer long enough to know that he never wanted to become a resident. Nor did death offer a temptation. Total eradication was an interesting concept only as long as it wasn’t himself being offered as a subject to be studied. Benihime would never forgive him. Ichigo would figure out how to catch his detached soul and eat it out of sheer spite to prevent him from moving on until Ichigo did as well. Never mind that Ichigo had never eaten a soul before, he’d figure it out just to ensure Kisuke could not go. He snickered before cracking the seal on the next scroll, the contents of which killed it. Now he just wanted to hit his head on the desk repetitively.

Was it really necessary for a Captain to sign every request from their underlings to gain access to the unsecured data library. He’d do it but why wasn’t this the archivists problem. It was understandable for a Captain to sign off if the requests were for data relating to missions or secured topics or kidō, but for calligraphy manuals, prints, and the basic academy primers? Was there rebellious sentiment that had never been expressed to him or was it a leftover policy from a council of the Central Forty-Six when they had been feeling more controlling than the usual? He irritably stamped his signature on the indicated location after reading through the request, they needed the calligraphy practice their handwriting was worse than his when done left handed and with uncontrollable hand tremors from lack of sleep and a pinched nerve. Grumbling in his head about the paperwork pile he reached for the next scroll.

* * *

Hiyori is suspicious of this new behavior from the stupid new Captain. But he’s at least working on the damn backlog he’s let build up so she’ll leave it be for today. Who knows maybe that’s how his guilt works, ignore paperwork for two weeks then try and clear it all in less than two days and repeat. She hopes not, but she’s not expecting much from this poorly socialized ex-second division member who likes science too much and can’t set a reasonable fitness test.

Dear kami the complaints she’s received. Sure some of the newer members may need a better level of fitness, and the sixth seat for damn sure should have been able to handle the last course set up without falling on his stupid face, but dealing with the complaints about how the unseated members shouldn’t have to be at the level to be capable of this madness is _annoying._ Normally she’d go yell at the replacement, but he’s actually working on things that are actually his responsibilities so she’ll bottle it up until he’s been in his _lab_ for a couple of days first, gives her a good reason to vent and maybe he’ll do the damn paperwork more if he realizes she doesn’t yell at him when he’s doing it. She continues down the hall ignoring the division members slumped against the wall or sitting on the floor; now clean but still softly whimpering about how they can’t feel their legs.

 _Weaklings_ she thinks and shuts the door to her office and settles in to work on organizing the old records that the Fourth seat had dug though. If they’re still out there moaning in an hour she’ll go chase them around to shut them up. Give them something to really moan about.

* * *

In the early afternoon Kisuke damn near broke his ink brush out of sheer surprise; Ichigo, in cat form, had just crossed into his passive sensing range. He wasn’t expecting him to be anywhere near Soul Society until tomorrow afternoon at the earliest, if he even had back traveled. And yet that was Ichigo and his oh so distinctive reiatsu heading towards him fairly quickly if stealthily. This changed quite a few of his tentative plans he’d been building as he slogged through his own backlog, but it was likely for the better. Ichigo never really approved of the plans that revolved around Kisuke sacrificing himself in some form or fashion.

He opened the window shutters when Ichigo entered the rear courtyard, and beckoned him to enter with a delicate press of reiatsu to reiatsu. Ichigo bound from the ground to the window sill, entered his office with delicate soundless grace, moved to sit on top of the table, somehow managing to look very relieved about Kisuke’s presence despite his small furry orange face, and waited patiently for Kisuke to close and reapply the privacy wards on the shutters. After doing so Kisuke promptly scooped Ichigo up and barely breathed the words “Not out here, it’s not secure enough for the conversation we are going to have” into his ear. After receiving a soft chirp of surprise from the handling.

Which made Kisuke doubly glad it was Ichigo who had come back with him, none of the others who had learned to be cat shaped put up very well with the indignity of being scooped up and carried without indicating first that they’d like to be. Ichigo had plenty of pride, but this wasn’t something he’d ever found offense over. If he knew and liked and trusted you, you could scoop him up when he was cat shaped and the most you’d get if you surprised him when doing so was a little questioning mreow. His sisters had frequently swept him up to cuddle and hold when he was cat shaped. Kisuke would admit to absolutely no one that he did done the same, Ichigo’s purr was quite soothing and the warmth and weight of him was very grounding. An enemy or someone he disliked trying to do the same however, would get a belly or face full of very sharp claws and teeth with fifteen pounds of very angry aggressive cat squirming around in their arms making defense difficult at best. Especially since Ichigo could use kidō while in cat form.

He promptly carried Ichigo into the little room off of his office, shut the door behind him, and activated his privacy wards before taking a seat on the floor and setting Ichigo down.

“The room is secure enough for anything you wish to say. None can see or hear in so long as we do not yell, while we can hear outside should anything occur in my office.”

Ichigo promptly shifted back, leaving Kisuke with the reassurance that Ichigo had not picked up any new injuries since arriving in the past, since Ichigo was naked. Although, Ichigo hadn’t failed at carrying over clothing into and out of shifts in nearly a decade and so asked “why?”

“Why am I naked?”

“Well... yes.”

“I woke up in the dirt of a Rukongai district naked. It was the middle of the woods, but still.” Ichigo shrugged as if that wasn’t of any importance before carefully reaching out his hand to trace Kisuke’s face with the back of his fingers.

Kisuke delicately caught Ichigo’s hand before he could bring it back to his lap in both of his, placed a kiss on the palm before lowering it down. That such a small gesture of affection still made Ichigo blush, well Kisuke found it adorable. But this wasn’t the time to tease. It was a time to gather information and plan.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The words did not wish to go. Still not completely happy with this. Oh well. Yeet.

**Author's Note:**

> I blame the discord server. You know who you are.


End file.
